Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): I welcome the officials to the meeting via Zoom. We have Christopher Andrews, the deputy director of animal health and welfare policy, and Darrin Fullerton, the head of livestock identification and germinal products policy. Gentlemen, please feel free to brief the Committee. Thank you for your time this morning.

Mr Christopher Andrews (Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs): First, I will give members a bit of background to the Bill. The legislation was introduced in the House of Commons in October 2024 as a private Member's Bill (PMB) by Danny Chambers MP. The Bill passed its Second Reading in November 2024, and, at that juncture, the UK Government decided to confirm their support for it. In February 2025, the Minister with responsibility for animal welfare at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), Baroness Hayman, wrote to Minister Muir to ask whether he wished to initiate the legislative consent process. In March 2025, Minister Muir said that he wished to initiate that process but his support was subject to the necessary approvals being obtained in the Executive and obtaining the views of the Committee.

The Bill is short: it contains eight clauses, five of which apply to Northern Ireland. It covers two topics, the first of which is the non-commercial movement of cats, dogs and ferrets between Great Britain and countries beyond the United Kingdom. The second topic is the welfare of dogs, cats and ferrets that are brought into any part of the UK, including Northern Ireland, from countries beyond the UK. Only the welfare element of the Bill will apply to Northern Ireland, but I will cover both elements in the briefing.

First, I will deal with the non-commercial movement of animals into GB. The Bill will amend assimilated European law on the non-commercial movement of pet animals, which is colloquially referred to as the "pet travel regulation". It will enable England, Scotland and Wales to reduce the number of personally owned dogs and cats that can enter Great Britain from countries outside the UK from five to three. It will also contain an enabling power to permit England, Scotland and Wales to make regulations that would restrict the importation of cats and dogs that are below the age of six months or are more than 42 days pregnant. That element of the Bill will not apply to Northern Ireland, as the EU pets regulation continues to apply in Northern Ireland and is contained in annex 2 to the Windsor framework. That said, I wish to highlight the point that the purpose of the amendments, particularly the proposal to restrict non-commercial imports of dogs and cats from five animals to three, is to enable DEFRA to deal with specific patterns of puppy smuggling that occur at Channel ports in England.

The explanatory notes to the Bill set out the particular challenges faced by Channel ports. Traffickers routinely try to bypass import rules at the Channel ports by presenting consignments of low-welfare pups as their personal animals in batches of five. Traffickers also use the Channel ports to circumvent puppy smuggling initiatives by bringing pregnant dogs into the UK, again under the pretence that the dog is a personal pet. I assure the Committee that those are not scenarios that we realistically encounter in Northern Ireland; rather, sadly, the evidence shows that Northern Ireland has been a conduit and a transport route for low-welfare pups that are then taken from here to Great Britain via our ferry ports and placed on the market by unscrupulous sellers.

I will now turn to the provisions that apply to Northern Ireland and for which we seek the Assembly's consent. The Bill will confer a power on all relevant national authorities in the UK to make regulations in their respective legislatures on importing cats, dogs or ferrets that promote the welfare of those animals. In the case of Northern Ireland, the national authority will be the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA), and the provision is a quite wide-ranging power. It is expected that we will use it to make secondary legislation to prohibit the direct importation of cats and dogs that have been mutilated. By that, I mean dogs that have had their ears cropped purely for cosmetic reasons or cats that have been declawed.

The Bill will also enable the relevant national authorities to outline the extent of the provisions that should be contained in any secondary legislation. Therefore, regulations could include the ability to enable cats and dogs to be exempted from certain provisions where an application has been made and a permit issued; the right to require records from individuals; the right of entry and to inspect, seize, search and detain; and powers to detain an animal where that animal is proven or suspected to have been illegally imported. As you would expect, the Bill also includes powers to establish criminal offences that, if prosecuted, could be heard in a Magistrates' Court or a Crown Court. Sanctions and penalties would range from a fine to a custodial sentence or both. The maximum penalty that would apply if an offence is sent to a Crown Court is imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years or a fine or both. Those penalties mirror the penalties available under the Welfare of Animals Act (Northern Ireland) 2011. Indeed, it is also already illegal under section 5 of the Animal Welfare Act 2006 to carry out:

That makes it an offence to crop the ears of dogs and declaw cats but only where that action takes place in Northern Ireland. It is also an offence to take an animal outside Northern Ireland and have those procedures performed elsewhere before subsequently bringing that animal back to Northern Ireland. Therefore, gaining the powers to ban the import of dogs and cats with mutilations could close off legal loopholes around ear-cropping or other mutilations where people buy those animals directly. Members will be aware that the Irish Government banned the import of dogs with cropped ears in September 2023. Therefore, we see the Bill as presenting an opportunity to establish parity across the island of Ireland.

No part of the UK was formally consulted on the contents of the private Member's Bill, nor is consultation necessary at this stage. The purpose of the legislative consent motion (LCM) is to provide powers to implement restrictions at a later date by way of secondary legislation. Therefore, any legislation would be subject to the full scrutiny of the Assembly, and the policy proposal would be subject to public consultation in Northern Ireland. I also assure members that, in accordance with the duty under section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, the Department has undertaken all the necessary equality screenings. It is the Department's assessment that there are no equality, human rights or good relations issues associated with the provisions in the Bill. Likewise, a rural needs impact assessment has confirmed that there will be no differential impacts.

To conclude, I stress that the Bill would make no immediate changes to the law here when it receives Royal Assent; rather, the Department would use the powers in the Bill to bring legislation to the Assembly with the aim of complementing existing animal welfare legislation. The end goal is to provide secondary legislation that safeguards dogs, cats, and ferrets and stops people owning personal pets that have been subjected to painful mutilations. I am happy to take questions, Chair.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): Thank you very much for that, Christopher. Thank you, Darrin. The paper states that it is normal practice for an LCM to be provided on Bills in advance of Report Stage in the House of Commons, so I presume that the Bill has been going through the relevant stages in the House of Commons for some time. I am interested in why we are being advised on the need for the LCM at what some might consider to be the last minute.

Mr Andrews: Yes, I know. I can only apologise for that, Chair. It is a PMB, and I guess that the issue here is that the UK Government decided to back the PMB and give it their support at Second Reading. In February, the Minister was approached and asked whether he wanted to undertake the legislative consent process, and we confirmed that in March. A number of internal clearances and approvals had to be achieved, and then it had to be referred to the Executive. With hindsight, if I were to do things differently, I would have approached the Committee at the same time as I approached the Executive. That would have saved an awful lot of time. I am content to review the processes personally, and I assure the Committee that I am happy to learn lessons from that. I am also happy to take the criticism on that.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): I appreciate that, Christopher. It is very refreshing, actually. I appreciate that, and I agree.

One of the two elements that do not extend to Northern Ireland is the measure to restrict the age at which dogs and cats can move into Northern Ireland. Movement below the age of six months is deemed to be contrary to Regulation (EU) No 576/2013 on pets, which, as it is contained in the Windsor framework, applies to Northern Ireland Can you clarify that and detail any other provisions that do not extend to Northern Ireland, please?

Mr Andrews: Yes. You are correct: the two main aspects are the six-months age limit and the ability to restrict animals that are pregnant. The other aspect is the dropping of what is deemed to be the number acceptable in a personal import from five to three. Those are the three main elements of the Bill that will apply in GB but not to Northern Ireland. As I indicated in my opening remarks, we do not particularly see any policy difficulty with that, so, if there were a so-called free hand to implement those policies in Northern Ireland, I am not sure that those would be policies that we would have recommended to our Minister or that those policies or proposals would have solved the problem. In Northern Ireland, we do not have that problem around personal imports: people trying to circumvent rules by bringing in pregnant animals.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): Is it fair to say that, in Northern Ireland, our part in this is more to do with export? The Bill will, perhaps, protect dogs from here entering England, Wales and Scotland. Whilst that law does not apply to import, it will absolutely apply to export to GB.

Mr Andrews: No. I want to clarify that this does not impact on any internal movements in the UK at all. There will be no restrictions on animals that are aged below six months or are pregnant going between Northern Ireland and GB; nor will the reduction of the limit from five to three apply. That will not come into play.

I will elaborate: the provisions brought forward by DEFRA are primarily to tackle the issue that it encounters in the south-east of England, where traffickers are pretending that consignments of pups are their personal imports. The typical scenario that DEFRA officials encounter at the Channel ports is this: a van will drive up; there will be three people in the van; they will have batches of animals — dogs — in the van; and they will all claim that those dogs are their personal pets and will use that to circumvent the legislation on importing pups into the south-east of England. It is a definite set of policies to deal with that scenario. When DEFRA tightened up on the trafficking of pups via the Channel ports, it saw a phenomenon whereby people brought in pregnant dogs instead, and that is why DEFRA is trying to bring forward that restriction on importing pregnant animals into Northern Ireland.

The other thing, Chair, is that we do not want to ever invoke any policies that impinge on the legitimate movement of animals between ROI and Northern Ireland. There is quite fluid movement of people between the two jurisdictions. For example, it would not be helpful to restrict somebody's ability to bring a puppy that is less than six months old into Northern Ireland.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): OK. That is teasing this out very well for me. Does that mean that the powers have no provisions related to the illicit movement of pups, pregnant dogs or any dogs on this island or across these islands? This extends purely to imports into the UK from other areas, particularly the EU.

Mr Andrews: Yes. The whole Bill is predicated on imports from beyond the UK into GB or, in the case of mutilations, from beyond the UK into the UK as a whole and into Northern Ireland.

I will add a little more detail on the normal trafficking scenario that we see in Northern Ireland. Unfortunately, we have tended to be seen as a hub of puppy trafficking. That tended to be indigenous illegal breeders here moving animals through Larne and Belfast to the bigger, more lucrative market in GB or those coming across from the Republic of Ireland into Northern Ireland. That has been happening in vanloads, unfortunately. It is not threes and fives; it is vanloads. However, I stress that we have had the Paws for Thought initiative in place since 2020 and that has been effective in dealing with Northern Ireland being used as a conduit for puppy smuggling. We have seen puppy movements through our ports drop from around 20,000 in 2020 to about 9,000 last year. We have separate initiatives here to deal with puppy smuggling in Northern Ireland, and they are very effective. We have not eradicated puppy smuggling through those — I do not think that we could ever eradicate it — but we have made a pretty hefty dent in it.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): I appreciate that. We know that smugglers will go out of their way to usurp anything that we do.

My final question is on the criminal offences. You said, I think, that sentencing for the criminal offences is in line with the 2011 animal welfare Act. Are you aware of moves to look at the legitimacy or weight of the sentencing for this? I do not want to be too party political, but it strikes me that we have an issue with lenient sentences, particularly for cruelty to animals.

Mr Andrews: Yes, we have done a lot of work in the past year or so around sentencing, because we are aware that it is an emotive issue for MLAs and has been a priority issue for our Minister. We have engaged with the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) to understand prosecution routes and why certain offences end up in certain courts under the Welfare of Animals Act. There is also ongoing engagement with the DOJ and the judiciary on sentencing and the powers used.

I stress that sentencing powers and how they are utilised are up to the judiciary in Northern Ireland. They are independently set outside the Department's influence, and Minister Muir has no influence that he can bring to bear on that. However, that engagement is ongoing. When we spoke with the Public Prosecution Service, it was of the view that the sentences, offences and penalties available under the Welfare of Animals Act are quite stringent when compared with similar offences. The maximum penalty available under the Welfare of Animals Act is a five-year custodial sentence. We have reflected many of the concerns raised in the Chamber and by stakeholders in correspondence with Minister Muir. There is a process ongoing with the judiciary, DOJ and all the other key players in that area to learn more about how offences are prosecuted and how we can reflect the concerns of citizens to those people.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): Thank you very much, Christopher.

Mr McAleer: Thank you for your presentation. Obviously, we have devolution arrangements here, and, in most cases, we prefer to bring forward our own legislation and scrutinise it appropriately. However, I recognise that this is a serious animal welfare issue, and it is important that legislation be brought forward to deal with that sort of trade. Will any legislation coming forward here be subject to full scrutiny by the Assembly and the Committee?

Mr Andrews: Yes, it definitely will be. We gain an enabling power. I want to stress that, if legislative consent is given for this Bill, we will not change any legislation immediately. It provides us with the enabling powers that will enable us to bring forward secondary legislation through the Assembly, and that would be via affirmative resolution. It would go through the complete policy development process, be subject to public consultation and then, ultimately, to be passed, it would be debated on the Floor of the House.

Mr McAleer: Thank you. You mentioned in your briefing that the South of Ireland had banned the import of dogs with cropped ears since 2023 and that this therefore creates parity between North and South. Are there any other areas where there is a policy divergence on how we operate here and in Britain compared with how the South of Ireland operates?

Mr Andrews: Not particularly. The Minister desired the legislation and the powers to deal with those particular mutilations, being mindful that the Irish Government had already moved on that and that England, Scotland and Wales could move on it. He did not want to see Northern Ireland being left behind. He was also concerned that, if we did not have legislation in place, Northern Ireland might be used as a staging post to bring animals into other jurisdictions, bypassing the legislation that has been brought in in Ireland and that will be brought in in England, Scotland and Wales.

Mr McAleer: That is great, thank you.

Mr McGlone: I just want to point out a linguistic thing in the draft legislative consent motion. Could you explain to me, please, the difference between the wording:

and the wording, "That this Assembly endorses the extension to Northern Ireland of the provisions within the Bill"? One seems quite woolly; the other is definite. Later in the draft legislative consent motion, it enables the making of legislation in the North. I just wonder about the relevance of the three words "the principle of" and what they mean.

Mr Andrews: I am happy to take that away and look at it, Patsy. It might just be an error on my part.

Mr McGlone: If you could, please, because, in my mind, it alters the meaning of the LCM.

Mr Andrews: I assure you that it is the consent of the House that we are looking for, not "in principle".

Mr McGlone: OK. Thank you.

Mr Irwin: Thank you for your presentation. Clauses 4, 5 and 6 do not extend to Northern Ireland. That could raise concerns about Northern Ireland having less stringent requirements than the rest of the UK. Is the Department content to allow a regression of standards in Northern Ireland?

Mr Andrews: I could probably refer to my previous answers, in that, whilst our hands are tied in respect of the legal position, when we look at the policy situation and the patterns of movements on the ground, we do not particularly see an issue in not being able to reduce the number of personal pets that can enter Great Britain from beyond the UK from five to three or with the provisions relating to pregnant animals. As I said, they are not necessarily patterns of movements or aspects of puppy smuggling that we see in Northern Ireland. The movements that we see tend to be in large batches. We tend to have, unfortunately, an indigenous puppy trafficking industry in Northern Ireland. In the main, we are not subject to animals being directly brought into Northern Ireland.

Mr T Buchanan: Thank you for your presentation. In clause 1, Northern Ireland is being treated differently, and the clauses that my colleague mentioned do not apply to Northern Ireland. Is that simply because there is a problem due to an EU law applying in Northern Ireland that is not applied in GB?

Mr Andrews: That is correct: the primary reason is the intersect with EU law: Again, I can only reiterate my previous answers. Even if there were the opportunity to look at this holistically, I am not sure that these are policy measures that we would bring in or that we have the particular problems that exist in England and need to be solved.

Mr T Buchanan: Is this a good position for Northern Ireland to be in?

Mr Andrews: In terms of?

Mr T Buchanan: Being treated differently from the rest of the UK.

Mr Andrews: I can only go back to my previous answers. On the basis of the examination of illegal puppy movements into Northern Ireland, there is not particularly a problem that would have been solved by applying the legislation or the amendments that England is bringing forward. Those are really well set out in the explanatory note to the Bill. They deal with scenarios that are specific to England and issues encountered at the Channel ports.

I take your point. Our hands are tied in respect of the Windsor framework. We do not necessarily have a free hand in that area. However, I do not see the outworking as being negative for Northern Ireland.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): May I ask for clarity on one point, Christopher? You outlined three specific differences, one of them being the case of a pregnant bitch dog, where the restriction would apply from EU to GB but not from Northern Ireland to the mainland. I will play devil's advocate. If a smuggler wanted to continue that practice, they could legitimately do it from France to the Republic. Then, with a change of ownership to Northern Ireland, because those rules do not apply from Northern Ireland to GB, there would be no restriction on that internal movement. In that way, the law could be circumvented. Is that fair?

Mr Andrews: That scenario could come about, Chair. However, I stress that there are other protections in the welfare during transport legislation on transporting animals in their final stages of gestation. Therefore, there might be other legislation that would catch that. I take your point.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): May I also ask about this one? I am interested in why you suggest that the Minister would not be interested in that, even in the Committee doing it. It occurs to me that not transporting a pregnant animal is good animal welfare. Have I picked you up correctly? Did you say that it was one that you would not necessarily have recommended to the Minister?

Mr Andrews: Fortunately, on the island of Ireland as a whole, the two jurisdictions do not tend to see an influx of pups from EU traffickers. Generally, the illegal puppy trade in GB is fed by two routes: the south-east and south of England are fed by illegal traffickers moving dogs primarily from eastern Europe; and the illegal trade in the north and west of GB — Scotland, northern England and Wales — is fed by illegal breeders based in Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland. We do not see it as an issue for Northern Ireland, because the legislation is about direct imports. The Bill deals with direct imports to the UK. We do not necessarily see movements and direct imports of pregnant animals. That does not tend to happen with puppy smuggling.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): To be fair, it does not happen because the market is not here. The market is in the south-east of England, as you pointed out. If a door closes, smugglers, who have no compunction about or interest in animal welfare but are driven by profit, will find another door. That is my point. What I am getting at is that, if a route or an option were open, not only would it not cause them too much difficulty logistically but they could transport a dog almost legally, because, if they could transfer ownership to Northern Ireland, the legislation would allow them to do so. We may not be able to tackle the issue of transporting pregnant animals with this LCM, but I am interested in that aspect. Unfortunately, the door nearly opens.

Mr Andrews: I am happy to follow up on that, Chair. I can contact colleagues in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine to ascertain the checks that they have on pregnant dogs and other animals that come into the South from continental Europe.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): What is the scale of the illegal importation of dogs that has led to the private Member's Bill, Christopher?

Mr Andrews: There is significant concern about trading from eastern Europe. The appetite and market in GB for puppies and dogs is significant.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): I will finish with this point: there is also the human health concern. We have had an incidence of rabies this week. I do not know whether anybody picked it up on the news, but a holidaymaker, not in eastern Europe but in Morocco, picked up rabies from a dog. We do not have rabies here, which is fantastic, but we need to ensure that we do not increase the risk of it by possibly opening up a further import route.

Do members have any other questions?

Have you anything to add, Christopher or Darrin? Darrin, you have been very quiet.

Aoife, have you any questions?

Ms Finnegan: I am happy enough. Declan asked the question that I had, and everyone else's questions were 100%. Thanks, anyway.

The Chairperson (Mr Butler): No problem. Darrin, we will get you next time.

Thank you so much. That was a worthwhile briefing, albeit a bit late, and it has certainly given me a few other queries and questions that I will return to. Thank you very much, gentlemen.